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DETAIL OF EVENTS

We can add details of an event. On the airplane from Glasgow to London, Junior read a book and drank a Coca-Cola. If we make the assumption that other relevant events do not happen, we can elaborate by adding another event, so long as it is compatible with what we have said. However the notion of relevant must be formalized very carefully, as is apparent when we elaborate a particular event as a sequence of smaller events. ``How did he buy the Kleenex? He took it off the shelf, put it on the counter, paid the clerk and took it home.'' A narrative that just mentions buying the Kleenex should not exclude this particular elaboration. Moreover, if we elaborate in this way, we don't want to exclude subsequent elaboration of component events, e.g. elaborating paying the clerk into offering a bill, taking the change, etc. Our formalism allows details of an event to be added by conjoining extra sentences.



John McCarthy
Thu Jul 8 18:10:07 PDT 1999